A boxing blog by Jimmy Tobin

“If it is a defense of Cotto that you want you need only ask yourself how he managed to achieve his industry leverage. The answer to that question forces you to examine the part of his career so strangely ignored: he made every fight the public could ask of him with the exception of one. Cotto, after giving Sergio Martinez a gold watch beating, perhaps should have fought Gennady Golovkin. Instead, he fought Saul Alvarez. Cotto was only ever going to make one of those fights because he was going to lose both. Forgive him then, for giving boxing’s most devoted supporters the fight they wanted.”

“Anthony Joshua retained his heavyweight hardware with a tenth-round stoppage of typically game Carlos Takam at the near-bursting Principality Stadium in Cardiff, Wales Saturday night. A right hand wobbled Takam at a time when he was as much a threat to Joshua’s unblemished knockout streak as Joshua was to Takam’s senses, and referee Phil Edwards, understanding which of the threatened most needed protecting, waived off the action. God save the King!…or at least preserve him.”

“The spectacle produced by one of the most intimidating fighters of the decade and the latest Mexican fighting icon was well short on violence. Were there moments where each fighter was hurt? Perhaps, though not so glaringly that one might expect such moments to trigger a sequence culminating in unconsciousness. Golovkin drove home a few signature blows; Alvarez managed to bury this fist or that into Golovkin’s ribs or chin. To say with confidence that either man was hurt, however, required looking closely for evidence, which, considering what the evidence is, should be rather obvious. No, it was a cautious and defensive fight between reputed punchers—did you wait two years for cautious and defensive?”